A Tale of Two Tensais
by Tamashi.no.Koe
Summary: I trusted him with my deepest secret because he trused me with his. Misaki, junior high third year and tennis tensai. Power hungry Misaki has her sights set on becoming the top player in Japan. What happens when another certain prodigy enters her life?
1. Familiar Stranger

Chapter One – Familiar Stranger

_I wonder how long he's going to be at it this time._ Watching him enter the court, I wondered this.

We had never spoken, never made eye contact, and yet we knew the greatest secret of the other. A secret I knew I could trust with him, because he had trusted me with the exact same one. A secret only we could fully understand.

I slammed my racket as hard as I could onto the ball, training hard because I and my teammates expected me to. Their hopes, my hopes, of a girl being able to defeat Tezuka, Akaya, Atobe...it all rested with me.

The tensai of Seigaku. Not female tensai, just tensai. It got really confusing sometimes, figuring out if people meant me or him when they said that, but he was never called the male tensai, so why the indication of sex in my title?

As both he and I knew, we prodigies weren't born with the skills, just the potential. Potential we both stretched to the full every day at this same tennis court. Funnily enough, the rest of the world seemed to think we were born with the knowledge of how to use stuff like Tsubame Gaeshi. Don't ask me why.

I hit another serve, watching him out of the corner of my eye, something I had been doing in increasing amounts those days. The easygoing smile that lingered on his face during matches had gone, replaced by a frustrated frown as he tried and failed to use a new move. My expression couldn't have been much different, preplexed as I was as to why my serve still seemed so slow. He let out an impatient sigh, not bothering to fake calmness in front of me, knowing that I was going through the same thing.

It was almost laughable. We probably spent more time together than with our own families. Countless nights had passed when we'd be there until dawn, training. We understood each other so well. But if asked about him, the only piece of solid information I could give was his name.

He seemed a god at school, always so detached and unfazed, with that permanent grin plastered on his face, melting the hearts of so many girls. I liked him better on our secret court, with his crystal blue eyes opened and narrowed. It made him look more human.

It was going to be another all-nighter. We both needed our new serves for matches on the next day. I watched as the sun, weary of our endless swinging of rackets, set beneath the mountains, its golden rays replaced by the pale beams of light that flooded the court after dusk.

"Oh god, I'm tired." I collapsed onto a bench, gasping for breath. My hand searched for my water bottle in the bag next to me. Gulping it down, I noticed that he had stopped too and was all but turning his bag upside down, looking for something. He was licking his lips a lot and appeared to be very dry at the mouth. Hey, tensais need to drink like everyone else.

Seeing as it would be very bad for Seigaku's boys' tennis club if its second best player died of thirst, I threw my bottle over. He looked around just in time to stop it from hitting him on the nose. I observed him swallowing the water as though he hadn't touched liquid in a month.

"Thank you," he panted, handing it back to me. Sitting down as well, he waited alongside me for his body to recover. Clothes soaking and sweat dripping off the tips of our noses, we were two very defeated looking tennis players.

I couldn't rest for long, I told myself. If I was going to win all three of the best players around before everyone graduated from school and started work, I needed to practice. But what was the point? I didn't know what I was doing wrong anyway

"Misaki," he suddenly said when I weakly took up my racket again. He picked his up too. And I knew exactly what he was thinking.

"Fuji." I grinned in anticipation.

_This could be interesting._


	2. Tensai Mentality

Chapter Two – Tensai Mentality

You'd think that a match between two tensais would at least be slightly interesting, but I can tell you that a game between two such people, who spent more time training together side by side than they did sleeping, is exceedingly boring.

I knew all his weaknesses, and he was all too familiar with mine. This made his method of attack very obvious to me, and my counter attack very plain to him, taking away the element of surprise from the game. Surprise, which took all the excitement of the sport along with it.

And yet I found it a refreshing relief, knowing that I had nothing to hide, or nothing I could hide, whichever way you put it. Truth be told, I loathed the scheming way I'd had to think, calculating with pained caution what I could show and what I could not reveal.

"You've mastered your Angular Snake, I see." Fuji turned his smile towards me after I had returned a ball that had looked quite normal--until it took a sharp 90 degree turn to the left. I watched the ball go only to see it flying back. Fuji had known before I'd even raised my racket.

"You know how long it took. In fact, you probably know even better than me." Keeping my grin on him, I moved into position to return the expected topspin ball. This sort of thing no longer required thought. Not after all the mock matches I'd had with him in my head.

Obviously he hadn't had as many of such matches, since he couldn't predict my use of Tsubame Gaeshi in my return. My favorite part of tennis resurfaced for a moment. No matter how well you knew someone; there were always some things you couldn't see ahead of time.

_You've forgotten that I too am a tensai of Seigaku. And that I need some way to pass the time during school practices. _

His eyes had snapped open with shock.

"I won't use it during an official match, of course." It was one of the many unspoken pacts between us. Infringement of copyright was strictly banned when the results really counted.

His turn to serve. Which serve, where it would go, how fast it would be...is there any more to know about a serve?

Incidentally, knowing whether it would work was important too.

In an ideal situation, the ball would have sped up right in front of me, so that it seemed to disappear. This, even I would have trouble dealing with. But it wasn't an ideal situation, and the resultant serve contained so little spin that I could consider it as a fast but normal start to the game.

_He will, of course, neglect the left corner near the net, like he does every time this happens_.But instead of going for the point, I caught he ball in my hand and tossed it back to him. "Try that again." Our match, while relaxing, was rather pointless, given that we knew what would happen anyway.

Once more he dropped the ball over his racket and sliced it so that it rolled over the length of the net. I stuck out a hand and the ball flew right into it. The spinning stopped a short while after I had caught hold of it. "Hmm...not enough spin..."

Rolling the ball didn't seem to do enough. The racket was simply too short to create any sort of significant impact. "Fuji, what if you did this?" I took out another ball and spun it with my hand before dropping and slicing.

For a moment, I thought it hadn't worked, but the instant before his racket made contact, my eyes were suddenly staring into thin air. We both jumped when a crash told us that the ball had somehow hit the wire netting around the court.

Out, but it had definitely worked.

Fuji looked round in wonder.

"You've forgotten what they call me at school. Now try that again."

Twisting his wrist, he spun the ball just as I had, repeating the whole process. I only just managed to return his serve by running forwards to meet it.

"More spin. Try to spin it faster."

Again.

"Faster."

And again.

So the training session lasted through the night, until the moon itself retired behind the horizon. "What will you call it?" I asked during one of our breaks.

He downed the water of my bottle. "Spin Serve?"

"Ne, practical, but much too plain."

"What do you suggest?"

"Disappearing serve?"

Running his fingers through his sweat matted hair he gazed up at the stars. "Disappearing serve..." Taking up his racket, he spun, dropped and sliced.

I trained my eyes on the ball, watched it until it disappeared in mid-court, only to reappear embedded in a bush.

I smiled. There had been a split second when the ball could be seen, the second it hit the court. It was not an impossible move to counter.

"You are ready," I said to him.

Yuushi and I stood in the outskirts of the court, observing the game from a distance. It would be rather awkward for two students of Seigaku and Hyotei to be standing together, since the match was between those two schools. And besides, there was no one else we wanted to stand with.

"Why Rikkadai? Why not Hyotei?" My one and only confidant frowned when I made my choice known to him. Loneliness was something I had long since figured to be an occupational hazard of tensais.

I shrugged. "They have all the Tezuka level players after all."

"And of course you will want to train to beat them."

Yuushi shared my love of victory, one of the main reasons why I chose him to be my closest friend instead of Fuji.

"You will want to start your attack in your third year of high school, second year if you can manage."

And his knowledge of me extended beyond my tennis skills.

I scrutinized Fuji's last serve, smiling at the look on Jiroh's face when he saw that he, well, that he couldn't see the ball. Perfect, as expected of the prodigy, though I knew what he'd had to go through to get to this point. The rest of the population, being ignorant of this, was screaming its wonder at his genius.

"Well, it's your choice. But tell me when you've completed your training," Yuushi told me before he left for the Hyotei stands. "We shall then have a match."

I watched Fuji execute one last Disappearing Serve before walking off in search of a place to train. There was no mistake as to who would win.

Tezuka, Akaya, Atobe...with power had come endless responsibility, with strength had come the obligation to prove myself in a male dominated sport. The burden had been laid on my shoulders because only I could bear it.

Tezuka, Akaya, Atobe...to reach my goal, I had to beat them all.

Tezuka, Akaya, Atobe, and perhaps...Fuji?


	3. Friend or Enemy?

Chapter Three – Friend or Enemy?

Fuji had once confined in me, in one of my last visits to our tennis court, that he often been faced with the dilemma of winning a match and winning his opponents good opinion. He dreaded having to play his brother Yuuta in an official match, because he knew not what to sacrifice, the match, or his brother.

Having no over competitive siblings, I hadn't quite understood what he meant, but I had begun to realize a fraction of what he felt during the tournament.

It was a competition for tennis players from all of Japan. Having won the girls' tournament with absurd ease, the rules had been bent and for once I was allowed to play in the males' championship.

I had felt a twinge of unease as I faced Tezuka, for I still bore great respect for him, and all that he had done for Seigaku. And it just didn't seem fair to him, with his just healed arm and all.

I had also been reluctant to beat Akaya, who had helped me a lot during my three years at Rikkadai High, and was actually a very amiable guy once he was off the tennis courts and with people he held a shred of respect for.

The same with Atobe, who had become something that resembled a friend to me, through Yuushi. Having had him in my class for a couple of years definitely added to that feeling.

Only when I'd faced Yuushi himself had I felt nothing of the sort. My tensai opponent had his eyes fixed on victory and victory alone, as I had. Any slack on my part would have resulted him my being defeated. Neither of us had held back, both understanding the others intentions.

But those pesky emotions returned with full force in the finals. I almost didn't want to step out into the court and face that last match. He stood there on the opposite side of the net, smiling as always.

He hadn't changed much, and I could fully predict the Disappearing Serve he used in the first game.

Nor had my memory changed. _For a split second, just when the ball hits the court, I will be able to see it. _

And I did. My racket smashed into the little yellow streak, making the ball visible to all for another fraction of a second. _And now, his left corner near the net will be unguarded_. I flung the racket forwards.

"15-love!" The crowd gasped. They knew as well as I did that Fuji's legendary serve had not been countered for all of the past three years. Of course, the normal rules didn't really apply for the person who technically thought up the serve for him, but the crowd wasn't expected to know this. Evidently he hadn't imagined such a scenario either, for his eyes grew wide with shock as they had three years back when I'd used his Tsubame Gaeshi.

_I'm sorry, Fuji. But if you know me as well as I think you do, you will understand that I must win._

And win I did as the game progressed, allowing myself no time or space for hesitation. As I said before, I knew his weaknesses, and his greatest one was perhaps his tendency to let his feelings slow him down.

"3-4, advantage to Misaki. Change courts!"

"You've improved much." He stopped as he passed me while walking to the opposite court.

"So have you." I struggled to remain indifferent, and strode right on. Any more conversation and my resolution would be in danger of wavering.

He knew exactly where my new Boomerang Serve would go, and was in position when the ball turned around in mid-flight, twisting back towards my court before hitting the ground and bouncing back to my side of the net.

As the spectators looked on, wondering how we seemed to read each other's minds, I rushed forwards.

I struck the ball. It flew right at him. He raised his racket, but before he could swing it down, the streak of yellow lightning suddenly made a sharp turn to the left, passing between his arm and body to hit the court a few feet behind him and roll off.

Being guarded against Fuji had been hard at first, me not having broken my habit of letting him see whatever new moves I was developing. But I had been careful not to use my Angular Snake in this way before, anxious to hide it until it was time for the two of us to fight it out. I looked away, not at all inclined to see the surprise mingled with a little hurt on Fuji's face. But as he should have ceased to trust me the way I'd once trusted him, he had no reason to expect that I would be as open to him as before. Not, at least, in terms of tennis.

Boomerang Serve. Return. Strike back. The ball flashed back and forth across the net, so fast that it was blurred.

"Ugh!" Yet another return. Fuji's hit had been so heavy; I'd actually slid back a few inches when countering it. Wash, rinse, repeat...

Rackets swung again and again as shouts and grunts echoed in the court. Even his features seemed fuzzy, such was our speed. I couldn't see it there, not very clearly, but I knew his smile had never once faded.

Match point.

"Ugh!" He had gotten stronger, but so had I. There were a few moves hed never seen before, but then there were some that were new to me too.

"Ugh!" I only just returned his last shot. He was a tensai, and who better to give a prodigy trouble than another of the same sort? We were equals, in so many aspects, except...

"Ah!" My last swing threw my whole body back. I'd saved the best--or worse, however you saw it--for last.

_With this point, I'll finally live up to the hopes of girls everywhere for me. _

_With this point, I'll win. _

I waited for my special move to take effect. Waited for the ball to bounce up and hit Fuji's hand, dislodging his racket.

_Is this really the sort of victory you want?_ There wasn't much time for me to decide on this, but before I had come up with a conclusion, the ball made contact.

When I saw Fuji's look of confusion and shock, I finally found my answer.

_No._

But it was too late to take the shot back. His racket clattered to a stop a few feet behind him.

"Misaki wins, 6-5!"

Cheers erupted, but I wasn't paying attention. _I will never use that move again._


	4. Double Victory End

Chapter Four – Double Victory

Champion of all Japan. After years of intensive training, the title was finally mine. Then why wasn't I as happy as I had envisioned myself to be?

'Happy' is what happens when your dreams come true, right?

Wandering around aimlessly under the harsh starlight, I thought back on all the years of grueling practices I'd been through, after I'd been labeled as a tensai. True, I'd wanted this title, the trophy I now held limply at my side, so much that the need for anything else had faded into insignificance.

And now I had my heart's desire. That burning in the pit of my stomach had finally subsided. I'd finally lived up to all my fans' expectations. So what wasn't there to rejoice about?

I'd gotten almost everything I'd wanted while I as still working my way to the present state of things: captaincy of Seigaku's Girls' Tennis Team, a scholarship at Rikkadai High, endless awards and now this final triumph. Everything I'd ever worked hard to get.

Of course, there had been a few things I'd had to let of along the way. A few of my teammates in Seigaku had been less than happy when I'd transferred to Rikkadai and led my new team to victory against my old one.

And Yuushi hadnt been all that crazy about me either; after I'd missed one too many of our private study sessions. I needed those as much as he did t omake up for all the time I'd spent playing tennis. Incidentally, Id missed those sessions because I'd been immersed in my training of said sport.

And...I looked up and discovered with a rush of memories where I'd ended up.

Another, the most obvious thing, that I'd lost was the peace I'd always felt while practicing with Fuji. In fact, I hadn't gone near the place since I'd left Seigaku, thinking it inadvisable for a player from a rival school to be informed of my progress. Especially a player I'd one day have to defeat.

Yet my footsteps' unconscious decision to go to our old court was a mark of how much I still thought of it.

The faint pinging of a tennis ball echoed from my old haunt. I wasn't particularly interested in meeting its occupant, but since I was around...

I had expected certain awkwardness between me and Fuji, given the previous match. But when I went round the corner and came into view of him bouncing a ball in his cheerful gait, it was as though no time had passed since my last visit to the court, the day before I'd started Rikkadai.

The swinging of his racket ceased once I stepped out of the shadows.

"What are you doing here at two in the morning, Fuji?"

"Saa, I thought you might come back. Want to play?" Smile intact and as pleasant as ever, he held out a racket.

For a moment I was taken aback. The reason I had slightly dreaded this encounter with Fuji was because in most cases, defeated players were entitled to a certain degree of bitterness, a privilege that they normally used to the full. While I had long since gotten used to the glares and mental daggers shot at me by my grumbling opponents, so that they now brought about no effect whatsoever, I was beginning to grow tired of their resentment.

He, however, seemed to have mastered the art of selective memory. Either that or the pressure had simply driven him over the edge.

I tossed my trophy aside where it gleamed, lying on its side, on top of the dusty bench, and accepted the racket. It occurred to me how ironic it was that I was casually setting down something I'd longed for, cried and sweated for, and taking up something that was actually of no importance.

Fuji didnt seem to find this at all strange, and simply trotted over to the opposite court, cheerily awaiting my serve. I didn't even bother to put too much power into it.

"Saa, congratulations. You're now the top player of Japan."

"Thanks. And, um, sorry you didnt get it. I mean, to be knocked out in the finals should be really frustrating." Was I sorry? I i was /i because he'd gone through all his training for nothing, but of course I'd much rather i I /i hadn't practiced in vain...

"I reached my purpose."

"Uh, Fuji," I countered his return. "I know I'm not the brightest person around, but even I can tell you didn't bring home the trophy."

Smiling knowingly, he hit the ball. "It doesn't matter. Besides, tennis is your life. You practice a lot more."

His last shot had been particularly fast. Having been tired out from my last match, I simply let him take the point. Running to return it wouldve been too much of a hassle. We both watched it roll away before I thought to pick it up.

"Although..." Fuji's quiet voice pierced the night. "I sometimes wonder if you even care about it any more."

I looked around at him incredulously. "Fuji, I worked day and night to get that." I jerked my thumb at my abandoned trophy.

"Yes, to get _that_."

His mind set was something of an enigma. "Then how can you say I don't care when--"

"The Misaki I know would never have used that last shot of yours." This simple sentence silenced me abruptly. "She wouldn't have found it exciting enough."

My laugh sounded harsh even to my own ears, but anyone who was that naive deserved the scorn. "You might not have noticed, but that mutation of Atobe's Rondo Towards Destruction helped me win."

"And can you think back on the game, now that you've won, and remember how much you enjoyed it?"

Not something you expect from the average tensai. "I _won_, Fuji," I reminded him, disregarding the rudeness of the words. "What isn't there to enjoy?"

I was looking into a pair of half opened sapphire eyes. This was nothing new to me, having peered into them during many a game of his, which I had studied from afar. But I was used to seeing stubborn determination lodged inside the bright blue orbs, never this steely glint, and certainly never directed at me.

"You won, I know. And I lost." He said it without batting an eyelid. "But I had fun and reached my purpose all the same."

It was amazing how quickly one guy could use up the stores of patience I had aquired over years of practice. "You _lost_, Fuji. You _lost_."

"I didn't come to win. A new award might have been a nice bonus, but I didn't come to win."

Like the touch of frost, his words froze all impatience in me and held back my retort for a moment. What sort of person enters a tournament with no intention of winning? Who goes through all the trouble of getting into the finals without caring about the outcome? This I would never understand. But now I knew, the reason I'd won in the end wasn't because I was necessarily more skilled. I'd won because I was the only one between the two who had actually wanted to.

"I came," his eyes softened and his smile reappeared, "to see how you were doing."

"Excuse me?"

"You stopped coming to our court, Misaki. It was very dreary, spending all my time here alone. And then you practically disappeared. There was no news of you even from Rikkadai. But I knew you'd resurface to enter this tournament, so I decided to meet you in the finals."

There was no way I could suppress the grin that crept up my cheeks. I knew he'd always been a little eccentric, but to do so much just to find me?

"But why did _you _enter, Misaki? Was it for the matches, or just that trophy?"

_Who even thinks about that sort of thing? "_Both, of course."

"And yet, now that there are no awards to be won, you allow me to take a point with a shot you could easily have returned."

He had a point.

"You really need to straighten out your priorities, Misaki."

Green clashed with blue as I leveled my gaze with his, matching his glare. Tensai eyes, someone had once said. Whether they were blue or green, their expressions were all the same to everyone else.

"Maybe you need to reassess yours." Electricity all but crackled between us. "You wasted a lot of time just to see how I was doing."

Again the benevolent side of him smoothened out his tiny frown. "It wasn't a waste of. The tournament was fun. And I got you back, didn't I? We're having a match."

I realized I was still clutching the ball in my hand.

"It has been lonely without you, Misaki."

_...the most obvious thing that I'd lost, was the peace I'd always felt while practicing with Fuji._

"You could always have found someone else to practice with." I didn't mean it, though. No one like another tensai to keep you company. There was no one I trusted more than Fuji to help me with tennis without regard of what advantage it would bring him, and no one I could rely on more easily to hide my weak side from the world, to keep secret the unfruitful hours I spent trying to master a new move.

There was no one I trusted more, period.

I tossed up the ball and hit it with newfound strength. "It's good to be back." There had never been much need for words or detailed descriptions of emotions between us. We both understood anyway.

His smile was just a little wider than usual. "And it's good to have you here again."

Things might never go back to the way they were; too much time had passed, too much had happened. And there was such a long road ahead of me, so many things to achieve...

But no matter how busy I got, perhaps there would be time--no--there would always be time, for a trip to the tennis courts with Fuji.


End file.
